


What it's for

by Vimes



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Blood, Depression, F/M, Mental Illness, Oral Sex, Trans Anders (Dragon Age), Vaginal Fingering, period
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-16
Updated: 2019-09-16
Packaged: 2020-10-19 21:53:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20664371
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vimes/pseuds/Vimes
Summary: Anders gets his period and Hawke does everything she can to comfort him.I wrote this for the kink meme prompt:"Between living as overworked and underfed most of the time in Darktown, and living with the Taint, Anders doesn't exactly have a regular cycle. When it does come around, it comes hard-pain with lightheadedness and nausea, chest tenderness, moodiness compounded with body discomfort, acne.In short, Anders feels like a mess, but is supported by his LI (preferably Hawke or Fenris) through it."





	What it's for

The spots always came first. Anders noticed a couple scattered across his forehead when he propped the mirror shard up over his wash stand to shave and whispered a prayer that it was just his diet that had triggered them. About a week ago one of his patients had insisted on paying him in left over pork products and surviving on meat alone since then has played merry hell with his skin.

But that same day he'd gotten into an argument with Fenris (go figure) and his usual simmering anger dropped suddenly into a deep dark feeling of helplessness and self loathing and he'd caught himself actually biting back tears.

Now he was sitting in his cot in his draughty little hovel, eyes fixed on a stain on the floor and slipping in and out of time. When he could make out his own thoughts they spun endlessly in the same circles, then drifted away as he lost focus and once again became almost hypnotised by the stain.

Hawke hadn't visited him in days. That wasn't unusual – she overworked herself almost as much as he did. But right now he couldn't fight back against doubt.

Was she happy with him? How long would this last? He always became too much work eventually, and just like everyone else, she'd get fed up soon enough. Too angry, too paranoid, too divisive, too hurt, too difficult. She was moving up, gaining friends and funds and followers with each passing day and Anders was still here, in the sewers. And now even his body was failing him.  
_What is the meaning of this self pity? This body has faltered before, it will recover with proper maintenance. _  
But he didn't even want to eat. If one more layer of bacon grease got stuck to his coat, dogs would start to follow him in the street. And he couldn't bear to sit here in gloomy silence, having dinner for one, pretending to himself it would be it made any real difference whether he shivered in bed with a full stomach rather than an empty one.  
_If we went to her house, Hawke would feed us. Inaction is not the right strategy – either get help or go to sleep so work can continue in the morning. _  
But he couldn't bear to be seen like this. A burden. A spotty, weepy, helpless greasy burden.

So when he heard the door creak open minutes later, his first instinct was to hug his knees tighter and hold his breath as if he could make himself small enough to disappear.  
“Anders?” came the husky whisper from the doorway.

Hawke. He didn't know whether he was more scared to see her here or pathetically grateful. “Anders, you can't be asleep already. It's not past ten!”

He licked his chapped lips. “I'm not, I was just... deep in thought.”  
She snapped her fingers and produced a flame above them, shrouding her face in soft, warm light. That casual grace shone through in everything she did... she could make the simplest spells look impressive and brand new. “In the dark? You haven't even lit a torch.”  
He forced a smile and lit a few cantles with a wave of the hand. “Feels like the sun set just moments ago. The darkness must have snuck up on me.”

“Oh, Varric should have been here to hear you say that. So poetic.”  
“Urgh, yes. He'd insist it was a metaphor for the state of my soul.”  
Hawke's smile faded slowly but her eyes were just as full of love and concern as before. When she looked at him like that, like he was worthy of her attention, he could barely keep his composure. He wanted to dismiss it as pity, but she was too good to think less of anyone for needing help.  
“It looks as if he'd be right to say it,” she said with a gentle laugh. Anders tensed as she came closer. “My love, what's wrong? Have you run out of things to be angry about?”  
“Hah. If only.” He turned his attention to his knee, where in the face of all logic, the patch he'd sewn on had begun to split across the middle. His patch needed patching up. “It's nothing. I'm just in pain, and when I get this cranky I'm no good company.”  
“Can't you just heal...?” Hawke started and then blinked as he shot her a meaningful glance. “Oh!”

He turned back to the patch and begun worrying the seams with a thumbnail for something to do. “Yes. Oh.”

Instead of speaking again, Hawke just flopped down beside him and put her arm around his shoulders. And Anders shivered and shut his eyes tight. Anyone else would say she knew what it was like, or that a mixture of such and such was supposed to do wonders, or shouldn't he be happy to have proof that he wasn't as ill physically as he looked? But not her, she was just here.... and he wished she hadn't looked around at her disciples and seen him missing, that she hadn't been worried enough to go find out why. Because right now he was even weaker than usual, and if he allowed her to share his burdens then when she eventually left they'd be oh so heavy to take back on alone.  
Anders shuddered and she pulled him close and down until his face was buried in between her breasts and soon soaking her vest with tears.  
“Oh Anders,” she murmured, and he shuddered again. “Why didn't you tell me? I would have come sooner.”

“I didn't... I was hoping it wasn't really going to happen.”  
“Has the blood come yet?”  
“No.”

“When will it?”  
It was a little awkward, but he pulled free long enough to tentatively touch his forehead. The skin was less oily, and the deep spots close to his hairline weren't as inflamed now as they had been. “A day. Maybe two.”

Hawke took the opportunity to grab hold of his chin and lift it until they made eye contact. “Let me bring you home. Sleep at the mansion until the worst is over.”  
“Oh, I couldn't.”

“Anders-”

“No, Hawke, I can't. There's an outbreak of measles and I need to stay in case there's news about the next transfer from the circle in Val Royeaux.” She was struggling not to roll her eyes and Anders pulled free. “This is serious.”  
“I didn’t said it wasn't serious, silly. But you’ll never run out of work.”  
He could practically feel Justice crackling with irritation and, prompted, said what he had to. “All the more reason to get on with it.”  
“Um, no. All the more reason to pace yourself today so you're alive to do it tomorrow. Look at you! When was the last time you ate something green?”  
_She doesn't value our work. If she had her way we'd compromise on everything until nothing remains but her and her distractions. _  
Shut up, Justice.  
“Hmm. Well, I found a slice of bread left in the bag, it was green in places...”  
“Not funny, Anders,” she replied and had to work hard to sound stern despite the smile playing on her lips. “You know I’m going to win this argument.”  
Anders pulled away and scratched the back of his neck.  
_We're so busy. Most of these symptoms are in your mind. They can be blocked out..._  
But if he stayed, there was the very real possibility he might collapse on the job. It had been months since he'd had his period, but he still remembered the pain becoming so unbearable all he could do was cry and vomit.

Justice's voice, or the voice of some part of himself that knew him well enough to find his weak spots, was losing strength like it always did when Hawke was near and he wasn't too far gone to feel the love radiating from her. A few hot meals and a mattress that didn't move of its own accord... it was starting to look like a very good thing. In one last effort of self sabotage, he wondered if he hadn't brought this on himself subconsciously as an excuse to shirk and be selfish.

Hawke waved a hand in front of his face and he was brought back into the present. “Hello? Anders?” She shook her head. “Grab your overnight bag, we're leaving.”

“Is this a deal breaker?” He asked, almost hopefully.  
“You bet your ass it is. Now let's go.”

Anders legs started giving out before they were even halfway to Hightown. In a hopeless effort to be optimistic, he remembered he should be thankful he had an excuse to lean on his staff and “pretend” to be injured instead of an apostate foolish enough to bring a weapon into public.  
In the gloom she couldn't see his cheeks turn almost greenish white and the wind from the ocean was loud enough to mask his short, strained breathing. Maker curse this shitty body – he punished it with starvation and stress and that made him weak and sore, and now when he'd relented and given it enough of a break to behave as it thought it should, it paid him back in blood and agony. That’s gratitude for you.

Bohdain was at the door even as they walked up to it, performing his duty as perfectly as ever. Oh and look – he'd even gotten that Look down, that look of 'oh no messere, please don't tell me you're bringing _that_ into the house'. Anders managed a weak smile in reply.  
“Bodain,” said Hawke, “could I trouble you to run a bath? And we'll have cheese and fruit brought to the room, as well.”  
Sometimes, Anders wondered how or if he even knew the woman in front of him. She'd taken to power like a templar recruit took to self flagellation and now she ordered her servants around with as much natural authority as she commanded her gang of miscreants in the heat of battle.  
He'd known since the moment he saw her that she belonged in dresses of silk and satin and they hung off her now as beautifully and with such a deceptive lack of effort as if she'd spent all her life in the position she deserved.  
Oh, she complained about the whispers of alliances by marriage and having to eat cucumber sandwiches in the company of people who kissed her feet this year after spitting at them this time last, but Hawke was like a cat. She thrived in the spotlight and combined killer and beauty as if the two were inseparable. And what was he? Haggard, suspicious and beat up...

No. She turned to look at him now and stretched out her hand without doubting that he'd take it. And she squeezed his and that sparkle was in her eye. She was a rebel, just like him. And he remembered what she'd said after they slept together the first time, when all his self hatred begged him to end it once and for all.  
Because of who and what you are, the world will give you nothing but grief. The biggest act of defiance you could commit is to spit in their eyes and take all the happiness you can get.  
Thinking she wasn't like him was an insult to everything she'd suffered through to get here. She was just better at it. That wasn't difficult, after all. Hawke could make rebellion look easy without making it look cheap.

“Hello?”

Anders blinked and tried to focus. Hawke was speaking to him and waving a hand in front of his face.

“I can tell you're about to faint but please wait until I get you into the tub.”  
“Is the bath for me?”  
“Well you're the one going in it, but the way you smell it's really for the sake of my poor nostrils.”  
Anders winced and tried to smile along with her.

“Oh, love,” Hawke said and sounded as if her heart was breaking. “Anders, I'm sorry.” She took his hand and kissed it. “I didn't mean it.”  
“Maker, I'm pathetic tonight,” Anders groaned and this time his laugh was genuine.  
“You're allowed. You can be the most pathetic man in Thedas if you need to be.”  
“I'm working hard enough at it, that’s for sure...”  
Hawke led him up the stairs and forced him down on the bed. He wished the context was different. The minutes floated together as he lay there with his head on her lap and finally allowed himself to relax. His hair fell around his face when she pulled it free and gently stroked his scalp. The servants were quietly setting up the room and he resisted the urge to get up and offer help. Every touch of her hands on his skin gave him a moment's respite from his thoughts and instead filled his mind with a blissful silence.  
When the last bucket of hot water had been poured into the tub, Hawke unbuckled the straps on his coat and helped him undress. It didn't feel sexual, and right now, no matter how much he always wanted her, he was glad of it.

For once Anders was going to just be in his own body. It didn’t have to be useful for anyone in any way besides being, well... his body. Not punished, not desired, not productive, not right or wrong. Just his body, and good because of that alone. Like he wished he could be...

He sat up, got out of the rest of his clothes on his own and then walked unceremoniously over to the bath and climbed inside, even as his knees threatened to buckle. The heat was a shock but after a deep breath it numbed him wonderfully in a matter of seconds. Muscles he hadn't realised he’d been tensing relaxed, the subtle ache that always lingered in his bones faded and the light from the fire dancing and dazzling on the surface of the water was mesmerisingly beautiful.

Even though servants murmured outside and Hawke padded barefoot across the floor to organise the room, everything seemed almost eerily quiet. Then Anders realised why – Justice hadn't spoken to him since he'd stepped into this room.  
It happened like this sometimes, that Justice sort of... excused himself, perhaps, or fell into the spirit version of sleep. Perhaps he felt unwelcome, or perhaps the fact that Anders had barely made it through this short walk had finally convinced him that hounding Anders would be completely counter productive. And he sighed a deep sigh of relief and smiled the first wide genuine smile he'd smiled in a long time.  
Hawke poked her head over his, bent over him, and she smiled, too.  
“See? I'm always right.”  
“I like it when you say that. Makes it sound like you're my wife, nagging me.”  
“You wish.”  
She pulled up a chair and sat behind him. What was she holding? Hawke screwed the lid off of something and Anders took a deep breath. Shampoo, scented with lavender. Maybe a life of luxury wasn't quite such a terrible idea, after all...

He lifted a scrawny arm out of the water and held up his hand, but she shook her head and gestured for him to sink down lower.  
“Let me,” she said.  
And Anders was still so weak, her kind attention brought the tears back. Sooner or later, she'd realise. She was a clever woman. She'd realise, and she'd resent him for accepting her love when he so clearly didn't deserve it. But yes, he was weak, too weak to do the right thing. He would accept it. So he sunk down and laid his head back and let her pour the shampoo into his hair and gasped in pleasure when her fingers combed and coated it, poured a little bit of water over his head and a few droplets escaped and trickled into his ear.  
“Oh, Hawke...”

His body was getting heavier by the second. Anders let the deliriousness of hunger and fatigue overtake him and it made the bliss of this almost sickeningly intense. It was a good thing he was mostly under water, because he felt sure it'd make him either drool or cry. Everything was still sore but relief was so close he could touch it.

This was what life should be. Not free of pain, but pain balanced out by kindness and sharing your troubles. Knowing Hawke, it was her turn soon enough to be in trouble, and Maker preserve him but he'd do anything to help. Out of all the injustices out there, the one he could least understand was that there were people who genuinely didn't want to offer this to their fellow beings, who didn’t reach out with compassion when others were hurting.  
Speaking of injustice...  
“Hawke, while you're waiting on me...”  
“Yes, love?”  
“Is there any wine in the house?”  
Without so much as a pause, Hawke flicked the water from her fingers and rose out of her seat. A moment later he heard the soft clink of glass against wood. The wine was on a little table beside him. Anders sat up, moved slowly as if stealth would help him get away with this, but even as he reached for the glass, Justice said nothing. And the first mouthful, the first he'd had in perhaps a year, was heaven. If he was allowed to have this, the pain would be so slight and he could just relax into it, let it happen, surrender to being incapacitated without crying, he could feel a little sorry for himself and justly so, without actually coming close to death's door. Hawke said he needed rest to stay strong and keep working. Didn't he think she was clever? Perhaps he should take her advice for once.

“You look drunk already,” she laughed. Anders grinned back.  
“You forget I've lost my tolerance by this stage.”  
“And you're drinking on an empty stomach, too. Here,” Hawke handed him a small, rough towel. “Scrub the grime off of you so you can sit up and eat.”

It took a while and wasn’t an elegant process, but he got there in the end. Top to bottom, inch by inch and it was like shedding skin (both figuratively and literally if he was to be totally honest with himself). Plates and bowls fought for space on the table and after the first green grape past his lips, Anders couldn’t have stopped himself from eating everything in sight if his life had depended on it. Pitted olives stuffed with spices, pastries that fell apart on his tongue and oozed with honey and vanilla, cheeses, fresh vegetables, slices of meat, cured and paper thin.

The very last of his shame came to good use as the only thing that kept his table manners from becoming bizarre. There seemed to be no end to the food but he was undeterred and Hawke helped him getting through it all every now and again by reaching out to pluck something from his path. The wine helped it all down and eventually, when he had cleared the table of the very last crumbs, he leaned back in the cooling water and sighed.

“How are you feeling, my little plague of locusts?”

“Like a pig ready for slaughter.”

“Morbid analogy, as usual.”

“I wouldn’t want you to think I’ve gone soft.”

Hawke laughed and confirmed that that ship had well and truly sailed. “Well, can I convince my tough, cold-hearted and completely self sufficient man to come to bed with me? You know I never feel safe without you there to protect me.”

Anders flexed his arms as a joke and Hawke purred, ran her hand over his bicep and feigned going faint. Beneath the act he could tell she was watching him with real appreciation because the humour faded from her smile while her eyes still lingered. Maybe it was thanks to his liquid courage that he believed her, but he sat up a little straighter and felt his cheeks flush with confused and gratified pride. “So, I’ve still got it then.”

“You’ve got it all. Bringing you back to mine wasn’t all selflessness, you know.”

Anders laughed. His breath was quickening and the familiar, hot ache shot from his heart right down to his crotch. He’d thought lust would be beyond him when he was in such a state, but it seemed nature really did trump all...

They had been together for years and she still had him hungry and comically single minded with just a glance or a word. Anders turned to look at her, let his gaze trail from her pretty, clever eyes to her lips, her neck, her skin barely covered by that wonderfully, cruelly short robe that cinched her waist so tight and hung so loose across her shoulders that he expected it at any moment to slip from them with the lightest breeze. When had she changed out of her clothes? She’d been in and out of the room while he was preoccupied with the pain... Things were really in a sorry state if Hawke could get undressed without his full attention, but he was making up for it now.

Knowing how she would respond if he ran his teeth over that neck, how sensitive it was and how it would betray her, knowing how those lips pressed and parted against his own, how they could please him, knowing how lips that pretty could form such filthy, filthy words... knowing already what that robe hid so poorly, what she looked like under him, what touches she preferred, how she wanted to be taken... no thrill of the new and unfamiliar could equal the thrill of knowing her. He was wet, already so wet that he could feel it even though he was literally lying in a bath. He thought he’d felt faint before, but now, with the blood rushing from his head he really had almost no strength left.

“Oh, Hawke... if I wasn’t such a wreck...” His quiet, low growl betrayed that he wasn’t exactly being selfless, either.

She smiled. “Well if you do want it, all you have to do is lie back and enjoy it.”

Anders hauled himself out of the water, grabbed the towel and dried himself off while thought it over. Hawke took her time looking him up and down again before she slipped away to get herself ready and give him some privacy.

Doubt, never far from his thoughts even on the best of days, was creeping back in. Anders liked to be the active party in the bedroom, one way or the other. Not that he was always such a giver, but when she was focusing entirely on him, when she was pleasing him, he was active in that, too, relishing his power. He worried that if he was still and she set the pace, if all he could do was feel and think, his mind might be free to go places he didn’t want to visit... then he remembered what a clever tongue Hawke had and shivered. Every suggestion she’d made this evening had been payed off and he was tipsy, tired and aching to lose himself in her. He’d learned his lesson. He would listen to her.

Hawke was lying on the bed with the blankets pulled back when he was ready to join her. When he came close she spread her knees, just a little, a silent invitation. He ran his palm up her thigh as a silent assent. The contrast of such soft, tender skin against his coarse hands got to him every time... Hawke sighed with pleasure but pulled away from him to sit up and leave room on the bed for him.

“You can play with me as soon as you’ve recovered. Tonight, let me take care of you.”

Anders swallowed, nodded, let the towel slide from his hips and lay down at her mercy. She could be gentle and good to him and that was exactly what had him worried... But then she was on top of him, hands on either side of his head, one knee by his thigh, the other pressing his legs apart and he rolled his hips up to let her feel how wet he was, how quickly she got to him. It was hard to stay a pessimist when she was near.

“Anders...” she sighed.

“See what you do to me?”

“I’m so sorry, my love.” She smiled, kissed his neck, teased his ear with her tongue. “How can I make it up to you?”

“Oh,” he moaned low, “I’m sure you can think of something.”

“Shall I kiss it better?”

Anders laughed. She had a way of making light of things that actually seemed to make them lighter. “As a healer, you know I’m always ready to try new kinds of pain relief...”

Hawke leaned out and looked down at him, mock grumpy. “That’s not a good argument. I don’t want to come to your clinic only to find you ‘healing’ people on your knees.” Still, she worked her way down, kissing his chest, kissing his scars, his stomach, nuzzling the trail of hair starting at his navel. It was unfair to expect him to keep his banter logically sound when he was so distracted.

“Hawke, you know... ahh... you know you get injured much too often for me to even find time to treat anyone else.”

She peered up at him from between his legs and that was a view, especially when her eyes were crinkled up in mischief like they were now, that he would never get over. “You’re saying it would take blood sacrifice to keep you faithful? Ooh, this is getting kinky.” She pressed her nose into his hair and her lower lip against his clit, teasing as always...

“Out of the two of us, you’re definitely the demon.” He felt a pang of guilt that might very well be Justice objecting to this kind of talk, but it didn’t take much effort to shove it aside. Justice had known what he’d signed up for.

Anders pushed his fingers into her hair, gently rolled his hips to grind up against her mouth and watched with a surge of heat how her expression changed from playful to needy.

If this was the only way to stop her talking, so be it. Hawke took the hint, closed her eyes, held on to him with her nails digging into his skin and started kissing him. Anders was so tired, so overwhelmed and so emotional behind his levity that every stroke of her tongue made him shiver and gasp and he fell back on the sheets, stroked her hair and let the sensation take him over. Tonight she wasn’t taking the time to explore him, kiss his thighs or tease his lips - he was already so wet and she must know that he didn’t have the strength to keep this up for long.

And Hawke knew exactly what she was doing, what he liked... her tongue dipped in beneath the hood,she breathed through her nose and kept her mouth so warm and soft and when she felt his clit stiffen, her full lips squeezed around it just hard enough for him to cry out and tense his legs as if his orgasm was already close.

“Oh, Hawke... Maker, how are you so good at that?”

She purred against him in reply, moaned every time she caught his wetness on her tongue, held his hips in place when he moved without thinking and stroked his sides when his sounds turned desperate. He wanted to reach for her, get one of his cocks out from the drawer beneath her bed, fill her up and give some of this pleasure back to her, watch her pretty face contort and shimmer with sweat as she rode him. Just lying here was agony but he knew she wouldn’t let him fuck her and that even if she did, he’d ruin himself with cramps in seconds.

“Please... more,” Anders groaned and she licked him harder, frowned, tensed against him and used her jaw to put even stronger pressure to his cunt. All he could do was press a hand over his mouth in a feeble attempt to keep quiet.

The longer Hawke went on, the less Anders struggled. Frustrations merged until his baser instincts convinced him that coming into her mouth would somehow solve every problem in his life at once and that there was no need to give more thought to her pleasure when his own was so strong. After all, she had insisted... and he would repay her over and over as soon as he was well again.

It didn’t didn’t help to hear her moan into him, louder and louder the more she felt him respond to her. If he hadn’t been desperate enough already, hearing her muffled voice grow ever more high pitched and pleading did it.

“Hawke, I need... I need something...”

She pulled away just long enough to speak. “You want me in you, too?”

Anders nodded, but she was licking him again and couldn’t see it. He could barely speak. A few attempts turned into incoherent noises before he could get out “yes... yes, please.”

Without missing a stroke, Hawke shifted her position and, gently, wetted two fingers by stroking them against him and, just when he was about to beg, slipped them into him.

Anders groaned and felt his knees shake. She curled them up, moved her head to keep up with his helpless shaking and squirming, rubbed up against his clit from the inside and her lips and her touch teased it from both sides. He could feel his wetness slipping out and trickling down her wrist, hear it when she pumped her hand and it made him grow even hotter to know how bare he was to her, how clear he made it that he was hers as she was his. His hands gripped the blankets, his head turned from side to side, he moaned and blushed at the sound of his own voice so loud and desperate in the quiet of the house. No matter how he tried he couldn’t stop himself from tensing and it brought the cramps closer as well as his relief.

“Hawke,” he breathed again, voice thick with the mounting pressure of tears. “I... I can hardly take it.”

They had been together long enough that both of them knew how to say things like that without worrying that the other would take it literally.

Hawke stroked his thigh with her free hand in a clumsy attempt to comfort him and helped him the way she knew he needed - by pulling his clit in between her lips, sucking gently on it and fucking him faster.

The pain and the pleasure were equal for a breathless moment, then Anders pressed up, threw his head back, arched his back until his weight rested almost entirely on his head and feet and came, tensing, clenching around her fingers, his whole body pounding and shaking as the very last of his strength was spent.

His cry was almost a sobbing howl. Hawke slipped her fingers out of him, kissed him still but gentler each time so that he could hold and draw out his orgasm, uncomprehending and seemingly endless, until it built up and crashed one final time and he collapsed.

All he could do was cry and shake and feel each heartbeat. Thinking, moving and speaking were beyond him, but he didn’t need to try because Hawke stirred, covered him in the warm blankets that smelled of her perfume, lay down beside him and pulled him close while he let it all out.

Her fingers left a trail of blood on the sheets but when she saw him looking she pressed a kiss to his forehead and held him tighter.

“Anders,” she whispered and in her voice he could hear everything she didn’t say; that he was safe, that she loved him and that if he wanted to, he could bleed on everything she owned without becoming a nuisance.

When at last his sobs subsided into sniffles she handed him a handkerchief, took it from his shaking hands once he’d blown his nose and replaced it with a fresh pair of small clothes. They already had a thick cotton pad tied to them and when he looked at her again, she laughed.

“Yes, I do think of everything.”

It was awkward to get them on when his limbs felt boneless but the pressure was comforting and he settled down finally to let the cramps do what they willed.

“Hawke,” he said.

He tried to find enough wits to apologise, or thank her, or comment on his own weakness but she could hear what he meant too and drew him back into her embrace without letting him continue.

For two such mouthy people, they sure were good at rendering each other speechless.

Anders was warm now. He could hear his tired heart, smell his scent on Hawke’s lips, feel the dull, hot cramps put pressure on his core and he couldn’t think or reflect as he usually would because every last reserve of energy he’d had was empty. But one thing came to him with the clarity only mindless wisdom had: what a wonderful thing it was to be accepted.

What a rare thing it was to be accepted even when you were really known. And how silly had he been to think he didn’t need this - what was he fighting for, if not for the dream that everyone could feel what he felt now in Hawke’s arms? An end to the idea that only the privileged few were born good enough to be safe...

“We can do it,” he mumbled. “You and me.”

“I know, my love. We’ll change the world.” He was just about conscious enough to hear that she was smiling, but not conscious enough to mind it or argue against it. Hawke stroked his hair, a sure fire way to get him to settle down, and he felt the pull of warm, cotton-edged exhaustion drag him down. “But first, we sleep.”

**Author's Note:**

> So I started this fic literal years ago, but with ADHD (and life) getting in the way I was only able to finish it today. If OP ever reads this: I'm very sorry it took me this long.  
The full prompt was this:
> 
> "Trans!Anders/LI-PMS Blues
> 
> I've seen a couple fics for Fenris , but none for Anders yet. Can also work in an Omegaverse setting.  
Between living as overworked and underfed most of the time in Darktown, and living with the Taint, Anders doesn't exactly have a regular cycle.  
When it does come around, it comes hard-pain with lightheadedness and nausea, chest tenderness, moodiness compounded with body discomfort, acne.  
In short, Anders feels like a mess, but is supported by his LI (preferably Hawke or Fenris) through it.  
Bonus  
+Sex is optional, but no dub-con or non-con if included. Orgasms are supposed to help with cramps.  
+Anders finding sweets and pastries just lying around when he's craving them. Not that his LI knows how they got there."
> 
> It's worth noting that I'm a cis woman and so I'm sure my portrayal of a trans man's experience is less than accurate. I've tried my best but I'm happy for criticism and will fix the fic accordingly.  
(I also don't know, nor can I imagine, what it's like to receive good cunnilingus, so that part I pulled completely out of my ass.)


End file.
